(a) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a thin film transistor array panel, and in particular, to a thin film transistor array panel including a fan out area provided with a connection connecting a signal line to a pad and located between a display area and a pad area.
(b) Description of the Related Art
Generally, a thin film transistor (“TFT”) array panel for a liquid crystal display (“LCD”) or an electro-luminescence (“EL”) display is used as a circuit board for driving respective pixels in an independent manner. The TFT array panel includes a scanning signal wire or a gate wire transmitting scanning signals, an image signal wire or a data wire transmitting image signals, TFTs connected to the gate and the data wire, pixel electrodes connected to the TFTs, a gate insulating layer covering the gate wire for insulation, and a passivation layer covering the TFTs and the data wire for insulation. The TFT includes a gate electrode, which is a part of the gate wire, a semiconductor layer forming a channel, source and drain electrodes, which are parts of the data wire, a gate insulating layer, and a passivation layer. The TFT is a switching element for transmitting the image signals from the data wire to the pixel electrode in response to the scanning signals from the gate wire.
A plurality of driving integrated circuits (“ICs”) are connected to the TFT array panel for applying driving signals to the gate lines and the data lines. The driving ICs are connected to the gate lines or the data lines via pads, which are clustered on a narrow area for connection to the driving ICs. On the contrary, the distances between the gate lines or the data lines on a display area are determined by the size of the pixels to have larger values than the distances between the pads. Accordingly, a fan-out area where the distances between the signal lines gradually increase is provided between the pad area and the display area. The fan-out area results in the difference in the length between the signal lines, thereby causing different RC delays between the signal lines. The difference in the RC delay causes a difference in image signals resulting in a deteriorated image quality.